[Below, Brzezinski contends that the last few lines of The Dream of the Rood refer to the Last Judgment rather than to the Harrowing of Hell.]

The narrative structure of The Dream of the Rood has been described as a Chinese box-like arrangement in which the Dreamer's first-person report of his vision frames the speech of the Rood, which in turn encloses a description of the passion of Christ. This neat equation of the Dream's structure with that of a Russian doll is, however, inadequate, as it neglects the concluding lines of the poem: the nested narratives are followed by a puzzling eight-and-a-half line coda which has been traditionally identified as "a brief and oblique allusion to the Harrowing of Hell." The interpretation of this passage as the Harrowing of Hell has presented a major obstacle to seeing The Dream of the Rood as a unified whole, an obstacle so great that some critics have termed the coda a later addition to the original poem, following [Albert S.] Cook's suggestion [in The Dream of the Rood: An Old English Poem Attributed to Cynewulf 1905] that the last section "has either come here by accident, or that the poet's judgment was at fault. The poem should have ended with 148a, or perhaps better with 146." While more recent critics have judged the coda to be part of the original poem, and indeed integral to its meaning, they have not been able to define precisely what function the reference to the Harrowing performs in the poem as a whole. [J.A.] Burrow ["An Approach to The Dream of the Rood, " Neophilologus 43 (1959)] sees the Harrowing as "an amplification of Christ's 'releasing power'" and "convincing in the general economy of the poem." [John V.] Fleming concurs [in "The Dream of the Rood and Anglo-Saxon Monasticism", Traditio 22 (1966)], fitting the end of the poem into the "thematic unity" of the whole. [N.A.] Lee speaks eloquently [in his "The Unity of The Dream of the Rood," Neophilologus 56 (1972)] for the unity of the Dream, but is not sure what lines 151b-156 refer to, and thus leaves "the interpretation of the remaining lines open for the present." Such attempts to argue for the unity of the poem, while well meant, are too general to convincingly include the coda in the overall structure of the poem. We are left with the questions any critic begins with: Why does the reference to the Harrowing occur here, at the end of the poem, and not where one might expect it, within the Rood's speech? Why does the poet not follow Cook's suggestion and end the poem at line 146, with the Dreamer's prophetic vision of eternal bliss? And why, instead of ending with this vision, as would seem appropriate, do we instead conclude with this flashback to Christ's life? By placing the "Harrowing of Hell" episode at the end of the poem, the poet has created a flaw in the chronological order of the poem, a warp in the temporal structure. I suggest that this time-warp was intended by the poet, and furthermore that The Dream of the Rood's coda refers not to one event in salvation history, but to several; in addition, its main reference is not to the Harrowing of Hell, but to the Last Judgment. It alludes as well to the Harrowing, and to Adam's fall, and to the Ascension, and through these multiple references it acts as a frame for the entire poem, positioning the events described in the Dreamer's account within the larger frame of salvation history by pointing to both the beginning and to the end of temporal existence. By its multiple references, the coda also acts as a contrast to the chronological structure of the first 148 lines, in which events in salvation history are told in the order in which they occured in time. By contrasting two different narrative techniques, the chronological narrative of the major part of the poem with the "oblique" narrative of the coda, the poet compares two views of time, man's and God's.

While the last lines of the Dream traditionally have been interpreted, with some disagreement, as referring to the Harrowing of Hell, there is no firm evidence for this identification. There is no specific reference to Hell nor to a prison in which the devil keeps souls; there is no mention of Old Testament patriarchs who are allowed to enter heaven as a result of Christ's victory at the Crucifixion. The coda speaks of þam-þe þœr þryne þolodan "those who there endured fire" (1. 149) and says of Christ that þa he mid manigeo com, / gasta weorode, on godes rice "then he came with many, with a company of souls, into God's realm" (11. 151b-52), and therefore does bear some resemblance to traditional descriptions of the Harrowing. But while the Dream's description does have these points in common with the traditional story, there is one major point at which the poem's version of the "Harrowing" departs from tradition. The primary importance of the Harrowing was that it was the first occasion when the Gates of Heaven were open to men, having been closed against mankind since Adam had fallen. The souls of the just who died before Christ's redemptive act were compelled to wait for Him before they could enter heaven, either in Hell itself or in Limbo. Yet the Dream portrays a number of saints already dwelling in heaven who are on hand to greet Christ on His triumphal entry. Christ's entrance acts as:

…englum to blisse,
ond eallum ðam halgum þam-þe on heofonum
  ær
wunedon on wuldre, …
(ll. 153b-54a)

If saints ær wunedon on wuldre "formerly dwelt in glory," the coda of The Dream of the Rood cannot refer literally and primarily to the Harrowing of Hell, asat that time only God and His angels lived in the eternal paradise. Lee recognizes this problem and attempts to solve it by saying eallum ðam halgum refers to the two Old Testament figures, Enoch and Elijah, who meet Christ on His return to heaven after the Harrowing in the Gospel of Nichodemus, Chapter IX; never having died, they are not subject to captivity by the devil and are permitted into heaven. [Robert Emmet] Finnegan more recently has suggested a similar solution [in "The Gospel of Nicodemus and The Dream of the Rood," Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 84 (1983)], stating that the phrase refers to the two patriarchs and to the Good Thief as well, since these three figures greet Christ in the Gospel of Nicodemus. Lee, however, admits that eallum ðam halgum is "rather an over-enthusiastic way" of referring to the two men (or even to three), and as an alternative suggests that halgum does not refer to saints at all, but to "holy spirits," i. e., to angels. It would seem, however, that this is not the case, as angels are specifically referred to in their own right, and eallum ðam halgum does not seem to be a variation on englum. As [A.D.] Horgan has recently pointed out [in his "The Dream of the Rood and Christian Tradition," Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 79 (1978)] in questioning the reference of eallum, the presence of and rules out the possibility of variation. The passage is thus a clear description of many saints on hand to welcome Christ back to heaven, and cannot refer to the Harrowing.

Because these lines in the coda cannot refer to the Harrowing of Hell, I suggest that the same details which seem to point toward the Harrowing in fact refer to another primary event in salvation history which has already been shown to be central to any understanding of the poem: the Last Judgment. A number of critics have concluded that an apocalyptic vision informs the whole poem and especially the concluding lines. Fleming, for example, says that the "whole poem reverberates with eschatological echoes," and [Fay] Patton ["Structure and Meaning in The Dream of the Rood," English Studies 49 (1968)] believes that in the last lines "the cross is associated with heaven and the Last Judgment." Lee, in a detailed study, analyzes the importance of the Last Judgment theme to the poem as a whole, showing that the Crucifixion and Last Judgment are connected with each other in the service of the Adoration of the Cross of Good Friday, specifically in an invocation that appears in the Regularis Concordia; there the Crucifixion is associated with the Deposition in the Tomb, the Harrowing of Hell, the Resurrectionand Ascension, and finally with the Second Coming. Lee finds additional connections between the Last Judgment and the Crucifixion in the liturgy for two feasts associated with the Cross, the Invention of the Cross and the Exaltation of the Cross, in homiletic literature, in other Anglo-Saxon poems, and in iconography, as in the Ruthwell Cross. He concludes that the connection between Christ's death and "seeming defeat" at the Crucifixion and His final "actual victory" at the Last Judgment is a natural one. While Lee's work focuses on the central portion of the poem, Payne has demonstrated that the opening scenes of the Dream, the Dreamer's first vision of the Rood's approach, is in fact a vision of the approach of the Last Judgment, described with motifs borrowed from traditional depictions of the last days, such as that by Ephraem the Syrian. [Richard C.] Payne further suggests [in his "Convention and Originality in the Vision Framework of The Dream of the Rood," Modern Philology 73 (1976)] that the key to the meaning of The Dream of the Rood is not the Crucifixion scene, as has been traditionally thought, but instead the first scene, the Last Judgment.

Payne's suggestion appears to be well-founded. The theme of the Last Judgment is central to the meaning of the poem, which opens with one judgment scene and has another in the middle (ll. 103b-21). I suggest that there is in addition a third depiction of the Last Judgment in the poem, in the last eight-and-a-half lines. The three judgment scenes together create one unified movement within the poem. The Dream of the Rood opens with the Dreamer fearful for the state of his soul in the face of approaching judgment heralded by the Rood; it is in this fear that he imagines the horror of the Last Judgment as described in the middle section of the poem. This horror is described not in terms of his own individual fear, but rather in terms of the fear of any man at Doomsday: Ac hie þonne forhtiaþ ond fea þencaþ / hwœt hie to Criste cweðan onginnen "But they then fear, and little think of what they might begin to say to Christ" (ll. 115-16). But as soon as the Rood comforts the Dreamer by telling him that anyone who trusts in the Cross has little to fear, his terror is gone and instead he looks forward to death. Immediately after the Rood finishes speaking, he prays to it bliðe mode and then imagines, not the dread of Doomsday, but the joy of his own arrival in heaven at the end of his life:

…ond ic wene me
daga gehwylce hwænne me dryhtnes rod,
þe ic her on eorðan ær sceawode,
on bysson lænan life gefetige
ond me þonne gebringe þaer is blis mycel,
dream on heofonum, þær is dryhtnes folc
geseted to symle, þær is singal blis,
ond me þonne asette þær ic syþþan mot
wunian on wuldre, well mid þam halgum
dreames brucan …
(ll. 135b-44a)

Thus comforted and assured of his own salvation, the Dreamer in his last description of Judgment presents, not Judgment itself, but its results for those like himself who have already merited salvation and who have been admitted to heaven at their death. Reunited with their bodies at Judgment, they now re-enter heaven with Christ to enjoy unending bliss. The Dreamer's description in the coda of saints who œr wunedon on wuldre (ll. 154b-55) is virtually a repetition of his prior description of his own arrival in heaven, where he might wunian on wuldre, well mid þam halgum (1. 143). The verbal repetition would seem to show that the Dreamer includes himself in the number of those saints who "dwelled already in glory." Because the Last Judgment for him and for his fellow saints is simply a break in their eternal bliss, he does notfear it, and thus he does not describe it; instead his description of the Last Judgment in the coda focuses on the triumph of Christ and His saints.

There are several objections to the suggestion that the last lines of The Dream of the Rood refer not to the triumph of Christ at the Harrowing of Hell but to His final triumph at the Last Judgment; the most obvious objection is that there is no actual judgment described in these lines. Yet while there is no explicit mention of any judgment here, there is no real need for one. The judging itself has already been described in the poem, in the middle section dealing with the Last Judgment, when Christ appears and questions the assembled masses concerning their lives. The third and last description of Judgment is a continuation of that action, and thus the actual judging need not be described again. In addition, by omitting the actual judging from the description in the coda, the poet is following a tradition which holds that there will be no judgment in the last days for those who have already been pronounced as just; the decision regarding a soul's consignment to either heaven or hell at the time of his death is a final one which will not be overturned at the end of the world. Accordingly, those admitted into heaven at the time of their particular judgment will not be included in the general, or Last, Judgment.

Augustine, in De Civitate Dei, Book XX, discusses the Last Judgment and various traditional beliefs concerning it in great detail. Before dealing expressly with the Last Judgment, he differentiates between the particular judgment God makes concerning each man, either during his life or at the moment of his death, and the general judgment that will occur at the end of the world:

ludicat etiam non solum universaliter de genere daemonum atque hominum, ut miseri sint propter primorum meritum peccatorum, sed etiam de singulorum operibus propriis quae gerunt arbitrio voluntatis … et homines plerumque aperte, semper occulte, luunt pro suis factis divinitus poenas sive in hac vita sive post mortem … Non igitur in hoc libro de illis primis nec de istis mediis Dei iudiciis, sed de ipso novissimo, quantum ipse tribuerit, disputabo, quando Christus de caelo venturus est vivos iudicaturus et mortuos.

Augustine then goes on to explain that those who have proved themselves in this life to be among the just will not take part in the Last Judgment, for that judgment is reserved for those condemned to eternal punishment. While the condemned will rise from the dead at the end of the world for judgment, the just need not do this because they have already been resurrected metaphorically inthis life from the death of sin to a life of grace in Christ. Augustine develops his argument as acommentary on John 5:27-29:

Ac deinde subiungens unde agimus: "Nolite," inquit, "mirari hoc, quia veniet hora in qua omnes qui in monumentis sunt audient vocem eius et procedent, qui bona fecerunt in resurrectionem vitae, qui vero mala egerunt in resurrectionem iudicii." Hoc est illud iudicium quod paulo ante, sicut nunc, pro damnatione posuerat dicens: "Qui verbum meum audit et credit ei qui misit me habet vitam aeternam et in iudicium non veniet, sed transiit a morte in vitam," id est, pertinendo ad primam resurrectionem, qua nunc transitur a morte ad vitam, in damnationem non veniet, quam significavit appellatione iudicii, sicut etiam hoc loco ubi ait: "Qui vero mala egerunt in resurrectionem iudicii," id est damnationis. Resurgat ergo in prima qui non vult in seconda resurrectione damnari.

The Dreamer in The Dream of the Rood appears to be a textbook case of one such as Augustine describes, one who has risen from sin to life by putting his faith in God or, as in the poem, specifically in the Cross. The Dreamer's moment of particular judgment in this life is that described in the poem; it is the moment in which the Rood approaches him and speaks to him of Christ's death, resurrection, and Last Judgment. The question that the Rood puts in Christ's mouth at the Judgment is not just a rhetorical question but is rather the question which the Rood, as Judge, puts to the Dreamer:

Frineð he for þære mænige hwær se man sie,
se ðe for dryhtnes naman deaðes wolde
biteres onbyrigan, swa he ær on þam became
   dyde.
Ac hie þonne forhtiaþ, and fea þencaþ
hwaæt hie to Criste cweðan onginnen.
Ne þearf ðær þonne ænig anforht wesan
þe him ær in breostum bereð beacna selest
(ll. 112-18)

While the Dreamer is imagining the Last Judgment, the moment is for him one of particular judgment: is he that man who would taste death for the Lord's name? Apparently he is; he also bears the best of signs on his breast. For it is clear that after this moment of judgment the Dreamer is no longer fearful of the Rood but instead finds all of his joy in it: Is me nu lifes hyht / þœet ic þone sigebeam secan mote (ll. 126b-27). Having placed his trust in the Rood and so having risen to everlasting life, he is confident that he will not be among those condemned at the Last Judgment.

The poet's emphasis on particular judgment rather than on the Last Judgment itself is not unusual in Old English poetry. [Graham D.] Caie, in his study The Judgment Day Theme in Old English Poetry, points out that in many Old English poems ostensibly dealing with the Last Judgment there is no scene describing the actual judging. Instead, the poems use the general context and metaphors of the Last Judgment to make the point that a man's fate depends not so much on the outcome of the Last Judgment as on the morality of his deeds, so that the act of judgment is not the operation of a single day but rather a "continual process during life." Caie's analysis of Christ III is especially relevant to a discussion of The Dream of the Rood, for the two poems share a number of important parallels: both open with the advent of the Last Judgment, which comes to surprise men asleep at midnight, and (as I argue) end with a scene of the Last Judgment which contains no actual description of judging. Caie observes, "The most interesting aspect of the poem is that, as is mentioned before (and in other Judgment poems), there is no actual judgment, no weighing of the souls and consultation in ledgers. For the judgment has already taken place and is taking place, the poet implies, in the present moment." This emphasis on the present moment would seem to be another parallel that Christ III shares with The Dream of the Rood. In the Dream, the focus of the whole poem, including the Rood's speech and its detailing of the Passion as well as the three Last Judgment scenes, is on the Dreamer and for his benefit. He must realize that the power of condemnation lies not with Christ nor with the Rood, but in himself. That one's fate is self-determined by one's actions is also shown in the middle Judgment scene in the Dream. Here too there is no actual judgment represented. Instead, Christ asks a question: He does not condemn but asks men, in the passage quoted above (11. 112-18) if they will follow His example in their own actions. Their fate depends not on Christ's pronouncements but on their own deeds.

While Old English poetry does not describe the Last Judgment in terms of judging, the poems usually do employ a number of common motifs to depict the event, one of which is prominent in the last lines of The Dream of the Rood: the function of fire at the Last Judgment. While there are different traditions for representing the last days—and the Dream employs several of those traditions—almost all of them make use of the fire motif. Fire was one of the "Signs of Doom" which would herald the end of the world and the Second Coming of Christ; as one of the Signs of Doom it can be found in the psalms, the prophets, the New Testament, and of course in Revelation. But in the Old English tradition, fire would not only be a sign of the approach of Judgment Day, but it would also be the means through which judgment would be accomplished. Fire coming down from heaven would at once be the agent of punishment for the wicked, akin to the fires of hell, yet would also be a purifying agent to perfect the just—a purgatorial fire. It would cleanse the righteous yet flawed so that they would be worthy of eternal life. Augustine in his discussion of the Last Judgment develops the idea of a purifying fire in his commentary on Malachi 3:1-6:

Ex his quae dicta sunt videtur evidentius apparere in illo iudicio quasdam quorundam purgatorias poenas futuras. Ubi enim dicitur: "Quis sustinebit diem introitus eius, aut quis ferre poterit, ut aspiciat eum? Quia ipse ingreditur quasi ignis conflatorii et quasi herba lavantium; et sedebit conflans et emundans sicut argentum et sicut aurum" … Nisi forte sic eos dicendum est emundari a sordibus et eliquari quodam modo, cum ab eis mali per poenale iudicium separantur, ut illorum segregatio atque damnatio purgatio sit istorum, quia sine talium de cetero permixtione victuri sunt. Sed cum dicit: "Et emundabit filios Levi et fundet eos sicut aurum et argentum; et erunt Domino offerentes hostias in iustitia, et placebit Domino sacrificium Iudae et Hierusalem," utique ostendit eos ipsos qui emundabuntur deinceps in sacrificiis iustitiae Domino esse placituros. … Filios autem Levi et Iudam et Hierusalem ipsam Dei ecclesiam debemusaccipere…qualistuncerit…eis quoque igne mundatis quibus talis mundatio necessaria est, ita ut nullus omnino sit qui offerat sacrificium pro peccatis suis.

The motif of fire as purifying agent appears to be a popular one in Old English poetry. In many poems the fire of Doomsday has a dual function, punishing the damned and purifying the saved. In Judgment Day II, for example, the fire that burns on the last day appears to fulfill both these functions at the same time, so that, as Augustine explained, the purification is actually a punishment:

ne se wrecenda bryne wile forbugan
oððe ænigum þaer are gefremman,
buton he horwum sy her afeormad,
and þonne þider cume, þearle aclænsed.
(ll. 155-58)

This same motif of fire acting as an agent both of purification and of punishment also seems to be found in The Dream of the Rood, in the coda which follows the Dreamer's description of his joy in heaven after his death. After the Dreamer has described his arrival in heaven and the singal blis (1. 141) of the feast of the "Lord's folk," the poem shifts into its enigmatic last lines with the reference to fire:

… Hiht wæs geniwad
mid bledum ond mid blisse þam-þe þær bryne
  þolodan.
(ll. 148b-49)

While the reference to "those who endured the fire there" has usually been interpreted, following Cook, as an allusion to "the spirits in prison who were released by the Harrowing of Hell," these lines contain a clue that this is not the real reference. The poet states that "bliss is renewed" for those who endured the fire. Yet the souls of the just consigned to Hell to wait for Christ had never experienced bliss; their first entry into heaven at the Harrowing is not a "renewal" at all but their first experience of the heavenly feast. The lines must therefore refer to souls which had previously experienced the beatific vision, then suffered in flames, and then been granted re-entry into the presence of God in heaven. These would then be the souls of the just admitted to heaven on the basis of their particular judgment, who then are re-united with their bodies at the Last Judgment. At that time both bodies and souls experience a final cleansing in purgatorial fire, and now being perfect re-enter heaven together with a triumphant Christ who has vanquished His demonic foe forever. The Dreamer imagines himself to be one of these privileged souls who endure the flames for a moment in order to become perfect. He does not dwell on the flames, any pain they may cause, or the imperfections they do away with, for these are not his concerns here; rather his theme is the triumph of Christ along with His Church, and so the poet's emphasis is on Christ's triumphal mission.

The reference to the Last Judgment in the coda of The Dream of the Rood creates several complex temporal relationships within the poem which together work to bind it into a unified whole. On a purely literal level, this description of the Last Judgment is a simple continuation of the previous narrative. The Dreamer has completed the section of the poem in which he contemplates the state of his own soul by looking forward to his own reward in heaven. His inmost thoughts are afysed on forðwege (1. 125) and he looks forward in happy expectation to the time when the Rood will carry him off to dwell in glory. He caps his expectations with a description of the joys that he expects to partake of in heaven. Thus it is only in keeping with this chronological structure that the Dreamer's mind should look forward beyond his own death and reward to a time still further in the future in which he will be one of the saints present at Christ's triumphant return from His final victory. Because at this time the Dreamer will be just one of many saints united in the Communion of the Blessed, he describes this final triumph in an objective third-person, and not in the emotional first-person style of the rest of the poem. The reward here is not a personal one for his deeds as an individual, as it was after his particular judgment, but instead reflects on the glory of Christ united with all His saints. Thus the Dreamer does not appear here as an individual at all, but as one of many. As the logical fulfillment to the Dreamer's moment of particular judgment in the poem, and as a reference to the last event in salvation history, the Last Judgment is a fitting ending to the poem.

The use of the Last Judgment as the ending point of the poem also creates a frame for the whole of The Dream of the Rood, for this passage is parallel to and yet thematically different from the opening passage of the poem. That opening scene, in which the Rood first appears to the Dreamer, is, as Payne has shown, a vision of the approach of the Last Judgment; many of the motifs here, including the presence of adoring angels, are used in descriptions of the Last Judgment. The motif of the Rood itself, a cross extending into the air and covered with jewels and blood, is used in representations of the Judgment by other Old English poets, who picture a gigantic cross covered with blood and gore but still shining magnificently. The fact that the Dreamer's vision of the Rood is a signal of the Second Coming would explain his terror at the sign of the cross; he is not merely awed but thoroughly frightened, and for the specific reason that he is intensely aware of his own sinfulness: Eall ic waes mid sorgum gedrefed; / forht ic wæs for þære fægran gesyhðe (11. 20b-21a) Clearly his state of terror is the same as that of those who in the Rood's description of Doomsday fear the word of the Lordoem—of the Rood from gallows to sign of victory; of Christ from defeated criminal to victorious hero; of the Dreamer from fallen Adam to a triumphant follower of Christ—but the major transformation is the change in the Dreamer's attitude toward the last days; he no longer fears damnation, for the Rood has come to tell him that, despite his sins, he will be saved if he in breostum bereþ beacna selest (1. 118). The Dream of the Rood fittingly ends where it began, with the Dreamer's fears for his own soul, but with those fears having been put to rest.

While the coda section has these narrative and thematic connections to the beginning and end of the "nested narratives" of the Dreamer's vision and the Rood's speech, it also contains within itself an even more complex set of temporal relationships. By referring to the Last Judgment, these lines point to the end of temporal existence. But the lines are ambiguous; they can also be interpreted as referring to several other events in salvation history. It is not without reason that they have been traditionally interpreted as referring to the Harrowing of Hell and that Fleming sees them as an allusion to the Ascension; these three events had usually been grouped together by Biblical exegetes as similar manifestations of Christ's power over the forces of sin and death. Through these ambiguous references to Christ's saving power, the poet has also created a reference to the time of Adam, the beginning of temporality, when Adam's fall created the necessity for salvation. The fall of Adam was especially connected with the Harrowing in tradition, for Christ at that time paid forever the wages due to the devil for original sin. The Gospel of Nicodemus illustrates the relationship between the two events by showing Adam as the first of the Old Testament figures to follow Christ out of Hell:

Et extendens Dominus manum suam fecit signum crucis super Adam et super omnes sanctos suos, et tenens dexteram Adae ascendit ab inferis et omnes sancti secuti sunt Dominum.

and into Heaven:

Dominus autem tenens manum Adae tradidit Michaeli archangelo, et omnes sancti sequebanter Michaelim archangelum, et introduxit omnes in paradysi gratiam gloriosam.

Thus by making this section purposefully ambiguous so that it can refer at once to the Last Judgment and to Adam's fall, the poet is able to refer at the same time to the two limits of temporal existence and to the central event of salvation history, Christ's redemption of mankind from Hell at the Harrowing. In a few economical lines he is able to sum up the important events of salvation: man's fall into sin, his redemption from punishment, and his final reward.

The economical narrative technique of the coda starkly contrasts with the expanding technique used in the main section of the poem. The Dreamer's momentary vision opens up to include the Rood's "biography," which in turn opens up to include a description of the Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension, and a prophecy of the Second Coming. Through this structural technique of embedding the poet shows that the story of the Rood and the life of Christ are central to the Dreamer's experience; they are at the center of the poem and are also central in importance. The Dreamer's life contains all of the elements of salvation history described by the Rood, in the sense that he has been directly influenced by them: through his participation in original sin he is prey to individual failings; he is saved by Christ's death but must undergo an individual judgment and a general purification before he can enter the reopened paradise. As the main portion of the poem is directed at the Dreamer, its purpose is homiletic. Its expanding structure is designed to drive home the point that the Dreamer need not fear the Last Judgment if he has faith in the Cross. The Rood's speech and the Passion narrative are embedded within the Dreamer's visionary experience; in this way the Dreamer's life is expanded to show how even a single moment in his life partakes of the entire expanse of salvation history.

The expanding structure of the poem, however, is quickly overturned once we get to the coda. Here the poem collapses in on itself; time, instead of expanding, becomes a vortex in which events separated by millenia seem to occur simultaneously. There is no longer any specific point in time to which we may refer, only a melange of past, present, and future expectation. The individual life of the Dreamer is no longer celebrated but is absorbed into the shared eternal reward of nameless saints. As such, the coda attempts to create the impression of the beatific vision. We view time not as man sees it, linearly, horizontally, but perhaps as God sees it—all of earthly time is a mere eight lines within the limitlessness of eternity, an infinity which frames temporal existence in the same way that the descriptions of the Last Judgment frame the Dream and yet remain at its heart. While the first 148 lines are a vision of time, the last eight are a vision of timelessness. Uniting time and infinity, past and future, expectation and reward, is the figure of the Rood. Just as the Rood's speech acts as intermediary between the Dream's consciousness and the Passion of Christ, it also acts as intermediary between time and eternity, as the herald of the end of the ages and the beginning of agelessness.